Vizag curator promises better wicket for final India v New Zealand ODI

The Vizag wicket has come under a certain amount of scrutiny in recent times following a few Ranji Trophy matches which have concluded in a matter of 2-3 days. However, ahead of the all-important India v New Zealand clash at Vizag, curator of the ADA-VDCA Stadium K Nagamalliah has assured everyone that the surface is going to be a batting beauty.

Earlier, the curator was under a considerable amount of flak following the Ranji Trophy encounter between Assam and Rajasthan. The two sides had faced-off against each other at the ADA-VDCA Stadium which played the role of the neutral venue in the Ranji Trophy encounter. Sunil Joshi, the coach of Assam, in fact, took to Twitter to lash out at the curator.

“Neutral venue @ Vizag Ranji game,17wkts fallen today 11 lbw’s from morning 9:30am to 1:45pm match over,Ind ODI venue here???????” K Sriram, the curator appointed by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) was sent by the board to inspect the wicket. Following his report, the latter said that the match was worthy of hosting the final encounter between India and New Zealand.

In spite of the critics received, curator Nagamalliah has said that the wicket will be a batting beauty. He had also revealed that preparing the wicket was not possible due to the continual rainfall. He added that the 21 days of non-stop rains had hardly given them a chance to prepare the wicket for the first match of the Ranji season, and the relaid wicket was not used at all.

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“The surface is hard. We have got adequate time to prepare the wicket, and I’m expecting at least 280-300 on the board,” he was quoted as saying by the Hindustan Times.